Sippican Historical Society

A small house
in a small town
with a large mystery.
I love visiting local historical societies. I’ve found it’s the best way to get a feel of what a town is like and to meet interesting people in the area. Sippican was the original name for the affluent little sea side town now know as Marion and they have a great little society of history.
Marion was a whaling and ship building town that certainly has a lot of history and the incredible woman giving us the tour of the house seemed to know every bit of it. She said she lived in Marion for 60 (or was it 70) years and knew every tidbit of history and gossip. Just one mesmerizing and humorous story after another as we walked through the house looking at artifacts and paintings.
She not only knew every person in every painting but could weave them into an interesting story relating to the town. She described every artifact not with just numbers and statistics but again spliced and braided into a fascinating story. People like her are a priceless asset to any town.
Of course one particular story that she told was about a particular ship. A particular spooky ship. A particular spooky ship whose particular mystery has never been explained.
The Mary Celeste was a brigantine that was carrying cargo to Europe. Her captain was Benjamin Briggs, a seasoned and very experienced seaman from the town of Marion. He had his wife Sarah and their young daughter on board as well as an experienced crew of 7 others. All regarded as stable and reliable sailors.
In the year 1872 the Mary was found floating near the Azores. The eerie part was that not a soul was on board. The weather had been fine and no unusual natural disturbances had been noted by other ships going through this well traveled area. When examined it was found that the ship had plenty of fresh water and food left on board and the cargo and even personal valuables like gold watches were untouched. Absolutely no signs of violence or struggles of any sort. Everything was perfectly normal for a sailing ship except for the fact that no people were on board.
Hmmmmm. So what happened to the Mary Celeste??? The short answer is no one knows. Of course theories range from the ridiculous and idiotic to the almost plausible. Virtually all people that jump ship show up eventually in some sleazy bar or at a friend or relatives house. Not one person on board the Mary was ever heard from again. Not one. Ever. Not even a hint or a clue. Totally gone.
One of the most intriguing and baffling ghost ships in history. No one knows what happened and I suspect no one ever will.